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Note that even if you accept this proof, it says nothing about a god that answers prayers or otherwise intervenes in daily life. It also says nothing about an a

by chroma 12y ago

Note that even if you accept this proof, it says nothing about a god that answers prayers or otherwise intervenes in daily life. It also says nothing about an afterlife. Unless you're a deist, ontological arguments are practically useless. They've been used in the defense of many gods now relegated to mythology.

elwell 12y ago
Or the FSM
gjm11 12y ago
I don't know about that. If you accept an ontological argument as valid, what it gives you is a god who's maximally perfect in every way. So then if you want to show (e.g.) that he answers prayers, all you have to do is to argue that answering prayers is more perfect than ignoring them. Descartes gives a kinda-ontological argument for the existence of God, and then he does indeed very rapidly move to deducing useful properties of God from it -- e.g., that he wouldn't allow us to be systematically deceived about everything. It's the basis of his whole epistemology, at least ostensibly. Whereas, say, a first-cause argument tells you there's something that's in some sense the cause or origin of the universe, but you've got a whole lot of work to do to get from there to anything relevant to actual religious belief. (Though, e.g., William Lane Craig does somehow manage to keep a straight face when transitioning at lightning speed from "something caused the universe to begin to exist" to "and that something must be personal, enormously powerful, etc.) (Lest I be misunderstood, I'll add that I think both ontological and cosmological arguments fail badly, and that neither of them either manages to give much reason to believe in a maximally perfect being / first cause / whatever, or to believe that such a being if it existed would have anything much to do with the gods of traditional religions. But it's not my purpose to litigate any of those claims here -- Goedel's argument is much more interesting than any I'd make.)
- chroma 12y ago
  I thought the same thing as you (answers prayers == more perfect), but figured proponents of the argument would ignore that. If a perfect being must answer prayers and prayers aren't answered (which seems to be the case), then it's kind of hard for a perfect being to exist. Either that or everyone is praying to the wrong gods.
- sjwright 12y ago
  > Goedel's argument is much more interesting than any I'd make. Hardly, it's just obscurantist gobbledegook dressed up as modal logic. It uses symbols and math to make the same basic errors that all other proofs make.
  - sjwright 12y ago
    It's disappointing that I'm being voted down. The argument only proves that perhaps some vague thing which Goedel slaps the 'god' label on might exist, or might have existed. The fancy looking methodology only serves to obscure this obvious limitation of logical argument proofs.
    - chroma 12y ago
      On the disagreement hierarchy[1], your downvoted comment is DH3 at best. Also, it's needlessly disparaging. I think you'd fare better if you avoided such digs at others' opinions in the future. Also, don't worry about downvotes. HN isn't that big, and individual comments are quickly forgotten. Think of it as feedback, not condemnation of you personally. 1. http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html
      - sjwright 12y ago
        I hadn't seen the disagreement hierarchy. Very cool. I'm not that fussed about the downvote, I'm just innately curious as to people's reasons.

by chroma 12y ago

elwell 12y ago

Or the FSM

gjm11 12y ago

I don't know about that. If you accept an ontological argument as valid, what it gives you is a god who's maximally perfect in every way. So then if you want to show (e.g.) that he answers prayers, all you have to do is to argue that answering prayers is more perfect than ignoring them. Descartes gives a kinda-ontological argument for the existence of God, and then he does indeed very rapidly move to deducing useful properties of God from it -- e.g., that he wouldn't allow us to be systematically deceived about everything. It's the basis of his whole epistemology, at least ostensibly. Whereas, say, a first-cause argument tells you there's something that's in some sense the cause or origin of the universe, but you've got a whole lot of work to do to get from there to anything relevant to actual religious belief. (Though, e.g., William Lane Craig does somehow manage to keep a straight face when transitioning at lightning speed from "something caused the universe to begin to exist" to "and that something must be personal, enormously powerful, etc.) (Lest I be misunderstood, I'll add that I think both ontological and cosmological arguments fail badly, and that neither of them either manages to give much reason to believe in a maximally perfect being / first cause / whatever, or to believe that such a being if it existed would have anything much to do with the gods of traditional religions. But it's not my purpose to litigate any of those claims here -- Goedel's argument is much more interesting than any I'd make.)

chroma 12y ago
I thought the same thing as you (answers prayers == more perfect), but figured proponents of the argument would ignore that. If a perfect being must answer prayers and prayers aren't answered (which seems to be the case), then it's kind of hard for a perfect being to exist. Either that or everyone is praying to the wrong gods.
sjwright 12y ago
> Goedel's argument is much more interesting than any I'd make. Hardly, it's just obscurantist gobbledegook dressed up as modal logic. It uses symbols and math to make the same basic errors that all other proofs make.
- sjwright 12y ago
  It's disappointing that I'm being voted down. The argument only proves that perhaps some vague thing which Goedel slaps the 'god' label on might exist, or might have existed. The fancy looking methodology only serves to obscure this obvious limitation of logical argument proofs.
  - chroma 12y ago
    On the disagreement hierarchy[1], your downvoted comment is DH3 at best. Also, it's needlessly disparaging. I think you'd fare better if you avoided such digs at others' opinions in the future. Also, don't worry about downvotes. HN isn't that big, and individual comments are quickly forgotten. Think of it as feedback, not condemnation of you personally. 1. http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html
    - sjwright 12y ago
      I hadn't seen the disagreement hierarchy. Very cool. I'm not that fussed about the downvote, I'm just innately curious as to people's reasons.